This study evaluates industrial competitiveness of 34 industries in the 41 countries in terms of several trade indices such as value-added RCA(VRCA) and value added intra-industry trade(VIIT). Conclusions are as follows: First, China is still showing week evidence to replace or overtake Korea in terms of VRCA. Second, it is not supportive of the assertion that the gap between Japan and South Korea had widened in the 1995-2011 period. Third, Korea’s exports pattern in the manufacturing sector has shifted from the one featured by
developing countries(re-exportation of final goods produced using imported intermediate inputs) to that of the developed(exportation of intermediate goods).
According to dynamic panel analysis regressing the RCA gap on the IIT gap, intermediate-goods RCA and the market share gap, the estimated coefficient of the gap between value-added IIT and gross IIT is 0.253 and statistically significant at the 2% level. This implies that increases in IIT or intermediate-good trades to sustain the global competitiveness are the main reasons for the gap between value-added RCA and gross RCA.

This study evaluates industrial competitiveness of 34 industries in the 41 countries in terms of several trade indices such as value-added RCA(VRCA) and value added intra-industry trade(VIIT). Conclusions are as follows: First, China is still showing week evidence to replace or overtake Korea in terms of VRCA. Second, it is not supportive of the assertion that the gap between Japan and South Korea had widened in the 1995-2011 period. Third, Korea’s exports pattern in the manufacturing sector has shifted from the one featured by
developing countries(re-exportation of final goods produced using imported intermediate inputs) to that of the developed(exportation of intermediate goods).
According to dynamic panel analysis regressing the RCA gap on the IIT gap, intermediate-goods RCA and the market share gap, the estimated coefficient of the gap between value-added IIT and gross IIT is 0.253 and statistically significant at the 2% level. This implies that increases in IIT or intermediate-good trades to sustain the global competitiveness are the main reasons for the gap between value-added RCA and gross RCA.